Cooperative Learning Across the Curriculum, strat. & reprod., (Scholastic)School by Samantha Berger and Pamela ChankoThis is the Way We Go to School
The Berenstain Bears Go to School by Stan & Jan BerenstainFish Out of School by Evelyn Shaw (Voc. School)The Teacher by Megan McCombsDid You See What I Saw? Poems about School by Kay WintersGet Out of Bed by Robert Munch (It’s time for school)

Background for Teachers

Children need an understanding of their surroundings, and how they
fit into their family, community, and the world.

Instructional Procedures

Invitation to LearnEagle Puppets with nests of rules: The teacher will
read the books Don’t Danny, Don’t and No David! to
the class. The students will discuss why we have rules and generate a list of
basic family and school rules. The list will be typed (short and sweet), copied
(one list for each student), and cut into strips. Each student will be given
two brown paper bags. One bag will be cut in half (width wise) and the top folded
down to form a nest. The other bag will be used for the eagle puppet. The copied
eagle will be colored, cut out, and glued onto the paper bag by the students.
The paper strips of typed rules will be placed in the folded paper bag. The
students will be divided into small groups. When possible, pair children who
can read with children who can not yet read. They will use their puppet to grab
a rule (eagle food) and share it with their partner or group.

Instructional Procedures
Our School is a Community: Teacher resource book—Cooperative
Learning Across the Curriculum. The teacher will read the book School.
The students will brainstorm who they think these school helpers are. A web
with “school” in the middle will be drawn on the class white board.
Add to the web and discuss what these people do to help us. The students will
be given an observation journal and shown how to use it (draw pictures of what
they see, smell, hear, touch or taste). The teacher will have made arrangements
with the school personnel ahead of time, putting footprints on their floor or
desk, and asking these people to describe to the children what their job and
duties are when they come to them. The teacher will read the book The Gingerbread
Boy and then the class will go an excursion of discovery to meet new people
in the school who may have seen the Gingerbread Boy. Gingerbread cookies will
be ready to eat at the end of the journey (check your local grocery stores for
a cheap sack of gingerbread cookies—I have found them at Albertson’s).

Extended Activities: Trace the gingerbread pattern
(given at this workshop) on tag board and staple the parent note along with
the self-information sheet and send one home with each child. When the self
portraits are returned, celebrate each child by reading their information sheet
as they hold up their model. Have someone take their picture. Later, put the
pictures on student-made cards, along with the information sheets inside, give
to their mothers for Mother’s Day.